Founding Engineer (Python / FastAPI / Next.js) — (US Based)

Role overview Take a working early product and build its technical foundation into dependable software for manufacturers and their brand partners. This founding engineer will own architecture and full-stack delivery, work directly with users and the founder to shape product decisions, and help establish engineering practices as the team grows.

Responsibilities - Assess the existing product and decide what to retain, rebuild, and strengthen; own the codebase and architecture. - Build full-stack features using Python, FastAPI, SQLAlchemy, PostgreSQL, and Next.js. - Create integrations with enterprise resource planning systems and other external tools, making data synchronization reliable. - Evolve the data model and maintain safe, reversible database migrations. - Develop real-time product features that keep manufacturers and brands aligned on production status, documents, and messages. - Own infrastructure, deployment, and monitoring; contribute to product decisions through design partner conversations. - Help shape AI-enabled functionality, set engineering standards, and support future hiring.

Requirements - Five or more years building production software with meaningful responsibility across frontend and backend systems. - Experience taking a product from initial concept or prototype to launch, ideally in an early-stage setting. - Fluency in Python and TypeScript, with experience in FastAPI or a similar framework and React or Next.js. - Strong PostgreSQL skills, including schema design, query tuning, and migrations. - Experience integrating external systems and handling reliability concerns such as retries, idempotency, and synchronization conflicts. - Product judgment and comfort making prioritization decisions, communicating clearly, and working closely with a hands-on founder. - Treat testing, monitoring, and dependable deployments as part of delivering software.

Nice to have Experience with manufacturing, supply chain, ERP, or B2B operations software; WebSocket-based features; or AI and LLM features such as document extraction or retrieval.

Benefits and work setup Remote within the United States, with regular in-person work sessions early on and occasional visits to manufacturing sites. Compensation is listed as $160,000–$250,000 annually plus equity.